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In encouraging summer camps to open this summer if they wish, the state is looking for a way to welcome people from outside its borders without upsetting the balance that has led to a low rate of Covid-19 in Vermont.
Ted Brady, deputy secretary of the Agency of Commerce and Community Development, outlined the Scott administration’s latest work regarding summer camp — both day and overnight — and child care at the governor’s three-times-a-week press conference Friday.
“For thousands of Vermonters, summer day camp is not a luxury; it’s a necessity,” said Brady, who has been working with camp operators, the American Camp Association, and others on guidelines for opening camps while avoiding the spread of Covid-19. Because summer camps serve for many families as child care, “summer camps simply need to be open if we expect the economy to be open,” Brady said.
State officials are issuing orders each week that slowly move the state toward economic recovery in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, which closed many businesses in March. Gov. Phil Scott’s announcement May 8 that child care businesses would be able to open June 1 if they wish was a big step forward for businesses that are trying to return workers to their jobs.
While Vermont’s many summer day camps serve as child care, its residential camps – some that draw as many as 500 campers at a time — are an important source of income to small communities.
The residential camps attract children and their parents from outside of the state, and Scott has made it clear he still wants people from outside Vermont to stay away to prevent the spread of the virus. But Brady said the state is working with camps and their association to figure out how children from out of state can come to Vermont camps.
“Overnight camps invite young people to learn about Vermont and fall in love with Vermont, and they help define the summer culture of dozens of Vermont communities,” Brady said. “While these reopenings are going to be more complicated, ACCD is working with the Vermont Camp Association and a sampling of overnight camps to learn what they can do to comply.”
Some camps, such as Farm & Wilderness in Plymouth, have already announced that they won’t open this summer. Many others are still waiting to see what happens in coming weeks.
The rate of growth in Covid-19 cases has been mostly in a decline since April, according to data from the Vermont Department of Health. As of Friday, the state had only five people hospitalized for Covid-19, with another 10 hospitalized with symptoms but awaiting test results, according to the health department. Just 2% of the Covid-19 tests conducted by the state are coming back positive, the department said.
That’s why it is time to start opening up daycares and summer camps, said Scott. But he and Brady reiterated that it’s not clear what those openings will look like. The American Camp Association and the YMCA, on which Brady is relying for some guidance, have hired a firm called Environmental Health & Engineering to evaluate the health standards that camps will require to operate this summer.
The Vermont Camp Association, which is working with Brady, is awaiting that guidance as well. The group won’t make recommendations to individual camps, said Ellen Flight, who is president of Songadeewin Camp in Salisbury and director of the association. She expects Songadeewin Camp to make a decision about the summer sometime this month.
Environmental Health & Engineering has said it will create a guidebook that summarizes and defines best practices and recommendations for day camps and overnight camps, aligned with guidance from the Centers for Disease Control.
The state isn’t going to issue a directive on camps, said Brady.
“It’s a decision the summer camps can make themselves,” he said. Vermont is still under an executive order limiting gatherings to 10 people or under. While that order – which is due to expire May 15 — will probably be eased in coming days and weeks, Brady noted that camp and daycare this summer aren’t going to look or feel the way they did before.
“While we’re pleased today that day camps and overnight camps have a path forward for this summer, they’re going to look different under Agency of Human Services guidance,” said Brady. AHS regulates daycares, and the guidance that it produces with its many state partners will probably involve masks, social distancing and a limit on participant numbers. “Some are not going to be able to accommodate that guidance.”
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